1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ac generator for a passenger car, a track, or other vehicles that is driven by an internal combustion engine.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is known that a stator winding of an ac generator for a vehicle is formed of a plurality of conductor segments which are welded together. WO92/06527 discloses an example of such a stator winding, in which each of the conductor segments is inserted from one end of the stator core, the ends of conductor segments are welded to one another at the other end of the stator core. Usually, insulators are inserted into slots of the stator core. JP-A-4-17539 discloses insulators, each of which has a U-shape cross section and folded lips formed at opposite ends thereof. The folded lips position the insulator in the slots easily.
However, it is difficult to insert the insulators into the slots because the insulator disclosed in JP-A-4-17539 has folded lips at opposite ends thereof. While it is easy to insert an insulator having no such folded lips into the slots, it is difficult to position such an insulator in the axial direction. If an attempt is made to fold an end of the insulators after the conductor segments are inserted into the slots, the folded portion may be damaged due to folding pressure. Thus, the conductor segments can not be insulated from the stator core very well by a single sheet of insulator film.